Finally got a decent scan of that weird structure out behind my property

We had something similar behind our place in the hills, turned out to be the footing for a windmill that pumped water up to a stock tank back in the 40s. The neighbor's granddad remembered it once I showed him a photo, which saved me a lot of guessing. Worth asking the oldest folks around before you commit to the well theory, because those forgotten foundations hide all kinds of stories.

On the capture side, I ran into the same canopy problem with my Anafi when I scanned a crumbling spring house last year. What helped was shooting in early morning with flat overcast light instead of a sunny day, since the harsh shadows thru the leaves were killing the alignment. I also added some ground photos from hand height to fill in what the drone couldn't see under the branches, maybe thirty extra shots walked around the base. The mesh came out clean enough that I printed it at about six inches wide and it sits on my desk now. One thing to check when you go back in fall: take a look at that pipe stub closely. On ours there was a galvanized casing still in the ground and the county health office actually had an old abandonment record for it. Public records plus a mesh from 500 pictures gave me the whole history without digging a thing.

My money is on an old cistern too, but I confirmed mine a different way: I dug around it. There was a pad about that size hidden in the fence line behind our place in Ohio, and everyone assumed septic. I worked a tile spade around the perimeter over two evenings and hit a tank edge maybe two feet down, plus a clay tile line running off toward the old house spot. Faster than waiting on anyone's memory, and I knew for sure instead of guessing. For your fall recapture, add ground-level shots. A drone-only pass tends to smear anything vertical like that pipe stub because the camera never sees it from the side. I prop my phone on a stick and walk a slow ring at chest height, maybe 40 frames, then feed those in with the aerial set. The pipe and any corner details came out far cleaner on my foundation model once I started doing that.

One other thing that paid off for me was old aerial photos. Our library had a 1950s county survey image and I could actualy see the house footprint that went with my pad. If there was a dwelling closer to the road like you suspect, it might show up plain as day on one of those.

Still pretty new here myself and mostly have scanned small stuff around the house with just my phone, so a whole drone pass over a property feature is way beyond what I've tried. Curious how you keep 400 shots from turning into a mesh that takes all night to process, or do you just let it run and walk away? I've been thinking about mapping the old gravel pad behind my garage the same way, though without leaves in the way since it's all bare dirt anyway. That mantel model idea is tempting, might steal it for the pad if mine ever comes out looking like anything.

For me the paper trail beat the drone every time. Our old slab turned out to be a seephole cover from a gravity spring box, and I only figured that out because the county kept plat maps from the 50s in the assessor's office. Ten minutes with those old aerials showed a roof line that's long gone, right where my 'mystery' structure sits. Libraries often keep that stuff too if the county doesn't.

On the print, go hollow with a low infill. My slab model was solid and it's heavier than it looks sitting on a shelf.

Update: called the county about those old plat maps and turns out they keep aerials from the 60s too, so I'm driving out there this week. Also hadn't thought about the windmill footing angle til that reply, but our slab has no anchors or bolt holes visible, so maybe not. Real question now: if the assessor's aerials show nothing, is the well driller's log the next place to look? Someone said the state keeps those.